Cowboy Cookies

From “Baked Explorations, Classic American Desserts Reinvented” by Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito, the owners of “Baked” in Brooklyn, NY.

I love this book!

I bought 5 copies of this new book for friends as Hanukkah and Christmas gifts this year. From the moment I cracked it open – I couldn’t put it down and ran out to the store to buy many of the ingredients needed to make these desserts. The only down side to the book – there is not a picture of each recipe. I have been spoiled by all the great food blogs out there and have a hard time getting enticed by a recipe with no pictures! This was the first recipe I chose to make out of the book and it didn’t have pictures so I hope you enjoy mine.

The recipe in the book says it will make 36 cookies that are 2 T. size balls. I like my cookies big and chose to make 22 cookies that were about 3 1/2 T. size balls. I made a few minor adaptations to the original recipe that are noted below.

1 ¾ c. all-purpose flour

1 t. baking soda

1 t. baking powder

½ t. salt

2 c. rolled oats

14 T. cold* unsalted butter (Recipe calls for cool but I don’t like cookies spreading too much so I used cold)

In the bowl of my stand mixer with the paddle attachment fitted, I cut the cold butter into chunks.

And then beat the butter and sugars together until creamy. I added the egg and egg yolk, beat until fluffy and then added the vanilla. Dissolve the espresso powder in ¼ c. hot water.

Beat the espresso powder in and then add half of the dry ingredients, beat just until incorporated and then add the rest of the dry ingredients and beat until incorporated again.

Fold in the chocolate chunks and crushed pretzels and refrigerate (I only did this for an hour but the recipe suggests 4 hours – who can wait that long?)

Look at this dough…

You can bet my daughter and I had a couple of spoonfuls! I’m a microbiologist and I still can’t help but eat dough, raw eggs and all!

Using a large ice cream scoop (with a release mechanism) I placed 6 x about 4 T. size balls of dough on the baking sheets. Lightly press the cookies down and place a small amount of additional crushed pretzels on the top before baking.

Bake the cookies at 350 degrees F on two baking sheets lined with parchment paper.

I like cookies to still be a bit soft so these only baked for 13 minutes. They cooled for about 3 minutes on the sheet and then I transferred them to the cooling rack.

In honor of May Lillie, wife of Wild West showman, Pawnee Bill, I thought maybe from now on these gems should be called “Cowgirl Cookies”! Enjoy.

Strudel and Streusel are two friends living in different cities, sharing a love of baking (and butter) through this blog. With Streusel in Denver, and Strudel in Seattle, we've found our little site to be a great way to stay in touch, share recipes we love, and talk about experiences in our respective cities.